The present invention relates to a vacuum cleaner. More particularly, the instant invention relates to a hand-held battery powered vacuum cleaner.
Portable hand-held cordless vacuum cleaners have become popular for cleaning a variety of surfaces in cars, offices and homes. Such vacuum cleaners are particularly useful for cleaning hard to reach places. Because they are light, such vacuum cleaners are also advantageous for performing small cleaning jobs where larger vacuum cleaners would be more cumbersome to use.
Vacuum cleaners, especially portable ones, usually include a rigid nozzle or dust bowl attached to a motor unit. The nozzle is detachable so that it may be separated from the motor unit for emptying. Some prior art vacuum cleaners include a locking mechanism consisting of a combination of an upper latch on the motor unit for engaging an opening in a top edge of the nozzle and fixed projections on the motor unit for engaging openings in a bottom edge of the nozzle. To unlock the nozzle, it is necessary to first release the latch mechanism at the top edge of the nozzle and then to disengage the openings from the fixed projections holding the bottom edge of the nozzle.
One advance over this design provides a nozzle for a hand-held vacuum cleaner which is attached to a motor unit using top and bottom latches which are actuated by pushing a single actuation button via a wishbone shaped pusher. This transmits mechanical actuation forces from a latch actuation button operating an upper latch to a spring bar connected to a bottom latch cam. There is also known a rechargeable vacuum cleaner having a nozzle latch button which is located near a motor switch and in which a part of the motor switch is in sliding overlying position relative to the latch button so as to help retain the latch button in a motor housing when the parts are assembled. However, in such vacuum cleaners, the motor switch and the nozzle latch button are not interconnected so that the motor can be actuated by the motor switch even if the nozzle is not securely latched to the motor housing. Also, the latch button could be inadvertently actuated after the motor has been turned on by the motor switch.
Because the known battery powered portable vacuum cleaners have a single nozzle, they are incapable of providing access to narrow crevices where a wand would be necessary. There is one known battery powered vacuum cleaner which has a mouth comprising a telescoping tube of two or more sections wherein one section is extendable outside the nozzle. However, this design is expensive and rather cumbersome as it requires the nozzle to have several additional components. There is also known a vacuum cleaner having an auxiliary nozzle which, when not in use, is supported by a recharging base of the vacuum cleaner. But when the portable vacuum cleaner is used at a location remote from its charging base and the nozzle is needed, it is inconvenient to have to return to the charging base in order to retrieve the nozzle.
There are known cordless portable vacuum cleaner designs which provide a cleaning brush adjacent the nozzle to allow a brushing up of dirt particles to enable them to be more easily sucked in by the nozzle. However, in these known designs, the cleaning brush is fixed on the nozzle and cannot be retracted into the nozzle when not needed or when its use would be counterproductive. There is also known a cordless hand vacuum cleaner which has an auxiliary brush tool that can be selectively connected to the nozzle. When not in use, the brush tool is not held on the vacuum cleaner but needs to be stored at some other location. This is inconvenient when the brush is needed at a particular time during a cleaning chore performed with the vacuum cleaner.
Accordingly, it has been considered desirable to develop a new and improved cordless hand-held vacuum cleaner which would overcome the foregoing difficulties and others while providing better and more advantageous overall results.